Second review (4 weeks): Detox and de-stress with Maya Fiennes DVD

Roughly four weeks since I started this: I'm thinking this DVD is not as easy as I first thought. Strange!

Maybe I've just improved my 'technique' somewhat and I'm doing the exercises properly?

What I like most about this DVD is the warm-up. There are five sets of exercises - to do sitting down - that take about 20 minutes. It's gentle but the stretching is quite effective. It eases the tension in my lower back and I can feel some of the pain in my shoulder muscles go away.

 

I have to admit that I'm not as keen on the rest of the exercises, especially the heavy breathing bits (breath of fire, canon breath etc) that make my throat go all dry. But if you manage to get through this, the meditation - or is it just called relaxation? - at the end is great. I usually find myself drifting off and don't want to get up.

There isn't too much chanting, which is a relief for me because it still makes me feel rather awkward. (It's not so bad if you're alone but I definitely can't get through the chants without giggling if I think my family can hear). There's a bit at the beginning of the warm-up (Ong namo) and another bit (Sat nam) at the end.

Fab news: Maya Fiennes mentions in her book (see related post) that the warm-up exercises are "a simple but effective daily exercise set". So it's better to do just the 20-minute warm-up every day than nothing at all... This keeps the whole integrating-yoga-into-daily-life thing realistic and it's especially handy for weekends (family time, in my case) and holidays.